English landowner and aristocrat (1825?1899)
Hugh Lupus Grosvenor, 1st Duke of Westminster
,
KG
,
PC
,
JP
(13 October 1825 ? 22 December 1899), styled
Viscount Belgrave
between 1831 and 1845,
Earl Grosvenor
between 1845 and 1869, and known as
The Marquess of Westminster
between 1869 and 1874, was an English landowner, politician and racehorse owner.
[1]
[2]
He inherited the estate of
Eaton Hall
in
Cheshire
and land in
Mayfair
and
Belgravia
, London, and spent much of his fortune in developing these properties. Although he was an MP from the age of 22, and then a member of the House of Lords, his main interests were not in politics, but rather in his estates, in horse racing, and in country pursuits. He developed the stud at Eaton Hall and achieved success in racing his horses, winning the
Derby
on four occasions.
Personal life
[
edit
]
Hugh Lupus Grosvenor was the second and eldest surviving son of
Richard Grosvenor, 2nd Marquess of Westminster
and Lady Elizabeth Leveson-Gower, the younger daughter of
George Leveson-Gower
, the 2nd Marquess of Stafford and later the
1st Duke of Sutherland
.
[2]
He was educated at
Eton College
and, until 1847, at
Balliol College, Oxford
.
[1]
He left Oxford without taking a degree to become Member of Parliament (MP) for
Chester
. This seat, a family borough, had been held by his uncle,
Robert Grosvenor
(later the 1st
Baron Ebury
), who decided to move to one of the two unopposed
Middlesex
seats. In 1851, he toured India and Ceylon.
The following year, on 28 April 1852, Grosvenor
married his first cousin
, the 17-year-old
[3]
Lady Constance Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, the fourth daughter of the
2nd Duke of Sutherland
.
[4]
The wedding was held in the
Chapel Royal
in
St. James's Palace
, London, and was attended by
Queen Victoria
and
Albert
.
[4]
Constance's mother had been
Mistress of the Robes
to Queen Victoria and a "favourite" of the queen.
[3]
Their first child, a son, was born in 1853, and Queen Victoria became his
godmother
. By 1874, the couple had eleven children, eight of whom survived into adulthood; five sons and three daughters.
[4]
In 1880, Constance died from
Bright's disease
(
nephritis
). Two years later, in June 1882, Grosvenor married Katherine Cavendish, third daughter of the
2nd Baron Chesham
and Henrietta Frances Lascelles. She was then aged 24; she was younger than the duke's eldest son and two of his daughters. They had four children, two sons and two daughters.
[4]
The succession to the dukedom (and estates) was destined to devolve upon the sons born of this second marriage, because although the first marriage had produced five sons who grew to adulthood, none of them produced heirs.
Political and public life
[
edit
]
Caricature of Grosvenor by
Carlo Pellegrini
in
Vanity Fair
, 1870
Grosvenor was elected as
Whig
MP for Chester in 1847 and continued to represent that constituency until, on the death of his father in 1869, he succeeded as 3rd Marquess of Westminster and entered the
House of Lords
. His maiden speech in the Commons was made in 1851 in a debate on disorders in Ceylon, shortly following his tour of the country. Otherwise he took little interest in the affairs of the
House of Commons
until 1866 when he expressed his opposition to
Gladstone's
Reform Bill. This played a part in Gladstone's resignation, the election of the
Conservative
Derby
government and
Disraeli's
Second Reform Act
. The relationship between Grosvenor and Gladstone later improved and in Gladstone's
resignation honours
in 1874, Grosvenor was created the 1st Duke of Westminster. When Gladstone became
Prime Minister
again in 1880, he appointed Grosvenor as
Master of the Horse
, a position appropriate to his interests in horse racing but "not an actively political office".
[4]
In the 1880s Grosvenor disagreed with Gladstone again, this time about
Home Rule for Ireland
. During this dispute, Grosvenor sold his portrait of Gladstone that had been painted by
Millais
. Ten years later they were again reconciled when they both opposed atrocities by the
Turks
against the
Armenians
.
[5]
When Gladstone died in 1898, Grosvenor presided over a Gladstone National Memorial committee that commissioned statues of him, and rebuilt Gladstone's
St Deiniol's Library
at
Hawarden
in north Wales.
[4]
In 1860 Grosvenor formed the
Queen's Westminster Rifle Volunteers
and became its
lieutenant colonel
and honorary colonel in 1881.
[6]
He led the
Cheshire Yeomanry
as
Colonel Commandant
from 1869.
[7]
He also supported charities; at one time or another, he was the president of five London hospitals, the
Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
, the
Metropolitan Drinking Fountain and Cattle Trough Association
, the Gardeners' Royal Beneficent Association, the
Hampstead Heath
Protection Society, the
Early Closing Association
, the United Committee for the Demoralization of Native Races by the Liquor Traffic, and the
Royal Agricultural Society
. He was a member of the Council for the Promotion of Cremation; at that time
cremation
was unpopular with the Church.
[4]
Grosvenor was chairman of the
Queen's Jubilee Nursing Fund
, an organisation that provided
district nurses
for the sick poor, through which he became associated with
Florence Nightingale
.
[8]
In 1883 he was appointed as
Lord Lieutenant of Cheshire
, and when the
London County Council
was created in 1888, he became the first
Lord Lieutenant of the County of London
.
[4]
Development of the estates
[
edit
]
The seat of the Grosvenor country estate is at
Eaton Hall
in Cheshire. When Grosvenor inherited the estate, it was worth at least £152,000 (equivalent to £17,740,000 as of 2023)
[9]
a year. After inheriting the estate, one of his first acts was to commission a statue of his
eponym
,
Norman
Hugh Lupus
, who had been the 1st
Earl of Chester
, from
G. F. Watts
, to stand in the forecourt of the hall.
[4]
Eaton Hall
as designed by
Alfred Waterhouse
St Mary's Church, Eccleston
as designed by
G. F. Bodley
In 1870, Grosvenor commissioned
Alfred Waterhouse
to design a new house to replace the previous hall designed by
William Porden
and extended by
William Burn
. The core of the previous hall was retained, parts were completely rebuilt and other parts were refaced and remodelled. A private wing was built as a residence for the family, connected to the main hall by a corridor. Waterhouse also designed
Eaton Chapel
and its associated clocktower and redesigned the stables.
[10]
It is said that the hall's guests "were not greatly amused" by the carillon of 28 bells that played 28 tunes and sounded every quarter of the hour during the day and night.
[4]
The work took 12 years to complete and cost £803,000 (equivalent to £102,160,000 as of 2023).
[3]
[9]
The hall has been described as "the most ambitious instance of
Gothic Revival
domestic architecture anywhere in the country",
[10]
and as "a vast, cheerless, Gothic structure".
[4]
Grosvenor in about 1878
Grosvenor paid for many buildings on his estates. He was a patron of the Chester architect
John Douglas
. Douglas' biographer,
Edward Hubbard
, estimated that the duke commissioned four churches and chapels, eight large houses, about 15 schools and institutions, about 50 farms (in whole or part), about 300 cottages, lodges, smithies and the like, two cheese factories, two inns, and about 12 commercial buildings (for most of which Douglas was the architect)?and these were just the buildings in the city of Chester and on the Eaton estate.
[11]
He commissioned
G. F. Bodley
to rebuild
St Mary's Church
in his Cheshire estate village of
Eccleston
, which was completed in 1899, the year of his death.
[12]
He also spent money on
Grosvenor House
in London and
Cliveden
in Buckinghamshire, which he had inherited on the death of his mother-in-law. He built shooting lodges on sporting estates in
Sutherland
, in Scotland, that he rented from his cousin, the Duke of Sutherland.
[4]
The Grosvenor wealth came mainly from the
ground rents
of
Mayfair
and
Belgravia
in London; these grew from about £115,000 (equivalent to £13,900,000 as of 2023) in 1870 to about £250,000 (equivalent to £35,550,000 as of 2023)
[9]
annually in 1899. He oversaw much rebuilding in Mayfair and commissioned architects?such as
Norman Shaw
,
Aston Webb
and Alfred Waterhouse?to design new buildings. He held his own opinions on architectural styles and decoration, favouring the
Queen Anne style
rather than the
Italianate
stucco
preferred by his father; for red brick and
terracotta
; for stucco to be painted bright orange, and railings in chocolate or red; and for
Oxford Street
to be paved with wooden blocks. He opposed the use of telegraph poles and wires and would not allow any building work during the London
season
. He encouraged the provision of more
urinals
, both on his estates and in London generally, and has been described as a "one-man planning and enforcement officer".
[4]
Personality and personal interests
[
edit
]
The duke's
Orme
by
Holland Tringham
, trained by
John Porter
at
Kingsclere
. (
Illustrated London News
, May 1892).
Grosvenor's major interest was in horse racing. In 1875, he established a racing stable at Eaton, eventually employing 30
grooms
and boys, with two or three
stallions
and about 20 breeding
mares
.
[1]
He regarded this, not so much as an extravagance, but rather as an
aristocratic
duty. He never gambled or placed a bet on any of his horses. In 1880, one of his horses,
Bend Or
, ridden by
Fred Archer
, won the
Derby
, and he had more Derby successes in 1882, 1886, and 1899. With his successes and sale of horses, it is considered possible that this enterprise was self-financing. Grosvenor took an interest in the country pursuits of
deer stalking
and shooting, both in the
Scottish Highlands
and on his Cheshire estate and added to the family's art collection. Grosvenor was
teetotal
and a supporter of
temperance
. In his Mayfair estate he reduced the number of public houses and beerhouses from 47 to eight.
[4]
Final years and death
[
edit
]
In 1899, the last year of his life, he supported the
Seats for Shop Assistants Act
(to reduce cruelty to women employees), stalked a stag in Scotland, shot 65
snipe
in 1½ hours in
Aldford
on his Cheshire estate, and attended the wedding of one of his granddaughters.
[13]
Later that year, while visiting the same granddaughter in
Cranborne
, Dorset, he developed
bronchitis
, from which he died.
He was cremated in
Woking Crematorium
and his ashes were buried in the churchyard of
Eccleston Church
, Cheshire. The 1st Duke of Westminster had two
cenotaphs
erected in his honour, one in the Grosvenor Chapel of Eccleston Church and another in the south transept of
Chester Cathedral
. Another memorial was a stained-glass window in the south transept of
Westminster Abbey
, dedicated by the Dean in September 1902.
[14]
He was succeeded as Duke of Westminster by his grandson,
Hugh
. At his death he was "reputedly the wealthiest man in Britain"; his estate for the purposes of
probate
was £594,229 (equivalent to £84.5 million as of 2023),
[9]
and his real estate (
entailed
therefore not included in his personal estate under the law of that time) was valued at about £6,000,000 (equivalent to £853.1 million as of 2023),
[9]
.
[4]
-
Grosvenor Chapel at
Eccleston Church
: Cenotaph and Garter Banner of the 1st Duke of Westminster
-
South transept at
Chester Cathedral
: Cenotaph of the 1st Duke of Westminster (detail)
-
Grave of Hugh Grosvenor, 1st Duke of Westminster
-
Grave of Constance Gertrude (nee Leveson-Gower), first wife of the 1st Duke of Westminster
-
Grave of Katherine Caroline (nee Cavendish), second wife of the 1st Duke of Westminster
Family
[
edit
]
Grosvenor in about 1855
The Duke married twice and was the father of fifteen children, twelve of whom survived into adulthood. The difference in age between his eldest son Victor and his youngest son Edward was thirty-nine years.
The Duke's first wife, whom he married in 1852, was his first cousin, Lady Constance Sutherland-Leveson-Gower, the fourth daughter of his maternal uncle the 2nd Duke of Sutherland. They had eleven children, eight of whom survived into adulthood, being:
[1]
- Victor Alexander Grosvenor, Earl Grosvenor (28 April 1853 ? 22 January 1884), who married Lady Sibell Mary Lumley, the daughter of
Richard Lumley, 9th Earl of Scarbrough
and Frederica Mary Adeliza Drummond. He was the father of
Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster
- Lady Elizabeth Harriet
(11 October 1856 ? 25 March 1928), who married
James Butler, 3rd Marquess of Ormonde
.
- Lady Beatrice Constance (14 November 1858 ? 12 January 1911), who married her stepmother's brother
Charles Cavendish, 3rd Baron Chesham
in 1877.
- Lieutenant-Colonel Lord Arthur Hugh (31 May 1860 ? 29 April 1929), who married Helen, a daughter of
Sir Robert Sheffield, 5th Baronet
, and is the grandfather of
George Alston-Roberts-West
.
- Lord Henry George (23 June 1861 ? 27 December 1914), who married, first, Dora Mina, the daughter of
James Erskine-Wemyss
, and was the father of
William Grosvenor, 3rd Duke of Westminster
; and second, Rosamund Angharad, the daughter of Edward Lloyd.
- Lord Robert Edward (19 March 1869 ? 16 June 1888), who died unmarried.
- Lady Margaret Evelyn
(9 April 1873 ? 27 March 1929), who married
Adolphus Cambridge, 1st Marquess of Cambridge
, younger brother of
Queen Mary
.
- Captain Lord Gerald Richard (14 July 1874 ? 10 October 1940), who died unmarried.
[
citation needed
]
Constance died in 1880. In June 1882, Grosvenor married Katherine Cavendish, the third daughter of the
2nd Baron Chesham
. She had four children with him, being:
- Lady Mary Cavendish (12 May 1883 ? 14 January 1959), who married, first Henry Crichton, Viscount Crichton (1872?1914), and was the mother of
John Crichton, 5th Earl Erne
; and second, Colonel the Hon. Algernon Francis Stanley (1874?1962), son of
Frederick Stanley, 16th Earl of Derby
.
- Lord Hugh William
(6 April 1884 ? 30 October 1914), who married Lady Mabel Florence Mary, the daughter of
John Crichton, 4th Earl Erne
, and who was the father of
Gerald Grosvenor, 4th Duke of Westminster
and
Robert Grosvenor, 5th Duke of Westminster
. He was killed in action in the
First World War
.
- Lady Helen Frances (5 February 1888 ? 21 October 1970), who married Brigadier-General Lord Henry Seymour (1878?1939) and was the mother of
Hugh Seymour, 8th Marquess of Hertford
. She gave her name to Lady Helen Seymour House, part of the former St Mary's Hospital for Women and Children in
Plaistow
.
[15]
- Lord Edward Arthur
(27 October 1892 ? 26 August 1929), who married Lady Dorothy Margaret, the daughter of
Valentine Browne, 5th Earl of Kenmare
.
[
citation needed
]
References
[
edit
]
Citations
- ^
a
b
c
d
"Westminster, 1st Duke of, cr 1874, (Hugh-Lupus Grosvenor) (13 October 1825?22 December 1899)"
.
WHO'S WHO & WHO WAS WHO
. 2007.
doi
:
10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.u192133
.
ISBN
978-0-19-954089-1
. Retrieved
8 February
2021
.
- ^
a
b
"Grosvenor, Hugh Lupus, first duke of Westminster (1825?1899), landowner, racehorse owner, and politician"
.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
(online ed.). Oxford University Press. 2004.
doi
:
10.1093/ref:odnb/11667
. Retrieved
8 February
2021
.
(Subscription or
UK public library membership
required.)
- ^
a
b
c
Newton & Lumby 2002
, p. 27.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
f
g
h
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
Thompson, F. M. L., (2004) (online edition 2006) '
Grosvenor, Hugh Lupus, first duke of Westminster (1825?1899)
',
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
,
Oxford University Press
, Retrieved on 26 April 2010.
(subscription or
UK public library membership
required)
- ^
Newton & Lumby 2002
, pp. 36?37.
- ^
Army List, HMSO, 1892,
- ^
Newton & Lumby 2002
, p. 29.
- ^
Newton & Lumby 2002
, p. 36.
- ^
a
b
c
d
e
UK
Retail Price Index
inflation figures are based on data from
Clark, Gregory (2017).
"The Annual RPI and Average Earnings for Britain, 1209 to Present (New Series)"
.
MeasuringWorth
. Retrieved
7 May
2024
.
- ^
a
b
Anon. (2002),
Eaton Halls
, Eaton: Eaton Estate, p. 6
- ^
Hubbard 1991
, pp. 63?64.
- ^
Pevsner & Hubbard 2003
, p. 213.
- ^
Newton & Lumby 2002
, p. 37.
- ^
"The late Duke of Westminster".
The Times
. No. 36884. London. 27 September 1902. p. 7.
- ^
"St Mary's Hospital for Women and Children Upper Road, Plaistow, E13 0DL"
.
Lost Hospitals of London
.
Sources
- Hubbard, Edward
(1991),
The Work of John Douglas
, London:
The Victorian Society
,
ISBN
0-901657-16-6
- Huxley, Gervas
(1967),
Victorian Duke: The Life of Hugh Lupus Grosvenor, First Duke of Westminster
,
Oxford University Press
- Newton, Diana; Lumby, Jonathan (2002),
The Grosvenors of Eaton
, Eccleston, Cheshire: Jennet Publications,
ISBN
0-9543379-0-5
- Pevsner, Nikolaus
; Hubbard, Edward (2003) [1971],
Cheshire
, The Buildings of England, New Haven and London:
Yale University Press
,
ISBN
0-300-09588-0
External links
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Barons Grosvenor
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